Katherine Melchior Ray - Speaker on innovation

Katherine Melchior Ray speaks on the following topics: innovation, disruption, management, leadership, culture and interculturel.

To book Katherine Melchior Ray, contact the Lespeakers agency. An advisor will call you back to scope the event, dates and format.

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Katherine Melchior Ray's fees:

• Conference : 8500 €

Booking is handled through Lespeakers.

Katherine Melchior Ray speaks as speaker in english and french.

Here is where Katherine Melchior Ray is based: Nice France (jan-juin).

I have been a global executive across five different countries.

I started my career in Japanese television, fascinated by the country and eager to be a journalist. After studying in Tokyo at Keio University, I was hired by Fuji Television, where I worked in both Tokyo, and then in New York for a total of eight years. This laid the foundation for my understanding of other cultures and my ability to create effective narratives. For one of the TV shows, I was responsible for stories on American brands Japanese viewers could buy online decades before the Internet. Identifying brands that would appeal to the discerning Japanese, negotiating the trade terms and producing the stories became a crash course in global marketing, and I loved the bottom-line results.

I moved into retail marketing for clothing and sportswear companies. I led international expansion for a startup selling children's clothing, Hanna Andersson, and then joined Nike as general manager of women's footwear. I applied the same skills toward the distinct target - a fresh, open mind to identify opportunities others had missed. We re-engineered women's shoes to adapt to women's bodies, specifically to prevent knee injuries due to their wider hips, and expanded into traditional women's domains such as walking, department store sales.

Nordstrom hired me when it purchased the French brand Façonnable as Director of Marketing and move my family to the headquarters in Nice, France. For four years, I managed all-French teams as we unified and expanded the brand internationally with new systems for branding, marketing, wholesale and customer development that promoted the quality of our products and the French Riviera lifestyle.

The CEO of Louis Vuitton hired me to run marketing for Japan, its largest and most profitable market, where Paris struggled to understand changes in the marketplace. Now managing an entirely Japanese team, we successfully launched new products, increased demand for existing ones, opened new stores and hosted breakthrough brand events pushing the brand to #1 position.

I moved to Gucci in Japan for another year and a half as Executive Director to unite previously disjointed efforts at bringing new products, and initiatives to market.

Over twenty years in retail, I drove growth across new product lines, distribution channels and international markets through innovation and insightful marketing. As a passionate consumer advocate, I led the development of global CRM strategies and systems tailored to cultural sensitivities.

Leveraging my luxury expertise, I moved into hospitality as global head of the Park Hyatt and Grand Hyatt brands. I proved investing at the top of the brand hierarchy increases value for all Hyatt brands through the shared customer loyalty program. We differentiated the brands from their competition with unique consumer experiences, omnichannel innovation, and globally aligned narratives. I initiated global partnerships with Sotheby’s and the Museum of Modern Art for the opening of Park Hyatt New York and Park Hyatt Vienna, increasing brand value with 200M impressions and +40% bookings.

Later, after working as a consultant, I was hired to move back to Tokyo as CMO of Shiseido’s Global Luxury Brands. I led the $3B portfolio to +20% top line and +8% operating profit by elevating the luxury appeal and increasing global recognition of the flagship Shiseido brand and the clé de peau beauté brand. I developed a more global leadership team and spearheaded the home organization’s digital transformation after identifying a proficiency gap between Japan and its target markets abroad.

Inspired by the tech revolution, I became CMO of Babbel in Berlin. I turned around the company’s top and bottom line after years of decreasing profitability by diversifying the product experience with new, more effective learning modules, increasing subscribers with Free Trial, and expanding the brand from a single product into a multi-platform offering. During the pandemic, I not only expanded the business but increased employee satisfaction with her transparent and inclusive leadership style.

Now I consult and teach at UC Berkeley Haas School of Business, which led to my writing my first book, "Brand Global, Adapt Local," with Nataly Kelly, CMO of Zappi. The book became the #1 Amazon Bestseller in International Business.

I received a Bachelors of Arts from Brown University, studied at Keio University in Tokyo and the Stanford d. School. I now teach at UC Berkeley Haas School of Business and am the expert in residence and a Strategic Board Member for EDHEC Global MBAs.

I was asked to speak to various groups after my book came out, and the response was fantastic. I decided to leverage my experience as a teacher and former on-air reporter to help more companies, leaders and students grow by learning to see anew to appreciate our differences.

audience says the talks are inspiring, engaging, reflective and makes them think about their own experiences and how to change their perspectives

Organizations like working with me primarily for the content I deliver that they say, "makes us think." As a team player and former C-suite leader, I believe in communication and collaboration and believe I do that with all my clients.